


Tardis, Cash Only

by cereal, gallifreyburning



Series: Tardis, Cash Only [1]
Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-26
Updated: 2013-10-26
Packaged: 2017-12-30 13:27:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,192
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1019156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cereal/pseuds/cereal, https://archiveofourown.org/users/gallifreyburning/pseuds/gallifreyburning
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not a bad little pub, the Tardis. Or: the Doctor's got a great team, but he needs someone behind the bar with him. Someone like Rose Tyler.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Because I can't stay away from AUs, I guess! All chapters after this one are co-written [gallifreyburning](http://gallifreyburning.tumblr.com) as part of one of our fic tennis matches.

It's not a bad little pub, the Tardis.

He's constantly doing repairs, constantly having to change the taps, fix the hob, rip out the plumbing in the loo, but it adds to the charm, he's sure.

And if some of the posters, the art on the wall, if some of it's covering holes from remodeling he never quite finished, well, no one's the wiser, and that, too, gives the place character. Or that's what those Yelp reviews say anyway.

He wouldn't change anything about his life or his bar, really, except for how sometimes, when it's very late at night (or very early in the morning, depending on your perspective), he wishes he could just hang on to some staff for a change.

He doesn't blame them for leaving, even helps them do it sometimes.

A few well placed calls so Jamie can stop dunking chips in a fryer and make real food in a proper restaurant.

A nudge in the right direction for Ace, because the cocktails she keeps dreaming up, especially the ones that involve fire, just aren't appreciated by the pint-of-lager crowd his place draws.

And Sarah Jane, oh, Sarah Jane who tried so hard to stay, who offered to run the pub while he went home for family business, and wasn't sure if he'd ever return to reopen, well, maybe he should have let her, he sees that now.

This new team he's got though, they show some promise, which means they'll leave, too, out his blue door and on to bigger and better things.

He hasn't had a floor manager like Donna in years. She knows how to keep the servers in line, but knows just as well (better even, maybe) that sometimes a customer is a lost cause -- one that needs to be tossed out on their arse.

There's Martha in the kitchen, textbook cooking if he's ever seen it, which makes sense with her in culinary school, but it's when she gets creative, when they run out of something because he's forgotten to pay the supplier, that she really shines. Her Weetabix chicken was a revelation on a plate.

He's not sure what, exactly, he pays Jack for, but he brings in the customers when it's slow, charming the queues outside some of the fancier bars nearby and convincing them to give the Tardis a shot instead.

And Mickey's great in a bind, can run the food, unjam the till, tap the kegs, and still find time to help Donna with the Friday night crowds.

But there's something missing.

He's not exactly lonely behind the bar, but sometimes he wishes there were someone else with him,  someone to catch the glasses he's fond of throwing, someone who keeps an extra bottle opener in their pocket because they know how often he loses his.

What he needs is the girl sitting at Table 3.

"That's Rose Tyler," Mickey tells him. "We grew up together on the Estate."

She's the only customer in the whole place not fixed on the football match, not shouting and shoving and being a wanker.

"Can she tend bar?" He asks Mickey, because he's watched her every time she's gotten a drink, analyzing the gaps in the crowd, ignoring the trouble spots, skating by drunks and loudmouths, coming away with her pint, and not spilling a drop. He needs someone levelheaded like that, someone that wouldn't let the madness the Tardis descends into sometimes get to them.

"Rose can do anything she wants," Mickey says, and the Doctor winces at the wistful tone in his voice, because if there's history there, _domestics_ , well, his isn't the sort of place for that.

"I'll give her a shot," the Doctor says, because a night like tonight, he could use the extra hands, even if they don't turn out to be a fit for long term employment.

She's back behind the bar with him fifteen minutes later, helping only because he so very clearly needs it, and it's already a brilliant fit. She's reaching around to plunk in the olives he's forgotten, not too heavy on the pour, Guinness with the brewery standard head on top.

He's probably already a little bit in love with her, but it might just be the shots Jack forced on them, trooping in with a group of tourists and 300 pounds worth of their business.

She sticks around, too, that night, helps him clean the place up long after everyone has shoved off, making Hemingway references and smiling when he tells her in a parallel universe, his bar is called A Clean Well-Lighted Place.

He wants to walk her home, or put her in a cab, at the very least, before he heads upstairs to sleep, but she waves him off. Nothing in this neighborhood that Rose Tyler can't handle she tells him; in response he asks her to stay.

"You could come work here," he says.

And she turns him down.

They're slammed again the next night and he follows Mickey around for an hour until he gives over her number.

She shows up again, a bottle opener in her pocket, and this time when he offers, she accepts.


	2. Chapter 2

She’d been so adamant about saying no the day before, the Doctor stops short, lager sloshing over the sides of the four full glasses in his hands.

“What. Really?” That last word might’ve been pitched a bit high – he clears his throat, composes himself.

She doesn’t seem to have noticed – she’s not even looking at him, she’s busy handing someone back their change, swiping off the sticky bar with a rag before putting a few coasters in front of the bloke sidling up to the bar. He’s smiling at her, almost verging on a leer.

“What can I get you?” she asks, grinning warmly back at him. The Doctor should be delivering these glasses to the opposite end of the bar, but Rose’s tongue is poking out of the corner of her mouth, and there’s lager running down his fingers, and he’s a bit distracted.

“Two pints of Old Speckled Hen, love,” the bloke says.

“Oh, that’s a fantastic choice,” she replies, reaching for the glasses. “’Course, we’ve got a special this week — Morland Original on tap. Much better, if you’re after a good bitter. It is, after all, the  _original.”_

“Yeah? All right then.” Rose keeps up her smile, chatting affably as she pours up two pints of the more expensive beer. The bloke hands over his cash and, with a wink at her, scoops up the glasses and heads out into the crowd, off to a booth somewhere.

“I’ll do it. But I’ll have to give my notice at Henrik’s,” she says, finally turning around to look at the Doctor. He blinks at her, at the hand on her hip and the pink flush across her cheeks and the way her honey-colored eyes have pinned him to the opposite wall. “And I’ll be having seven pounds an hour, plus tips. I don’t work in the kitchen — not because I’m above it or anything, but given half an opportunity I’ll burn cereal. So there’s that.”

“Okay,” he says. And then he can’t believe he did, because nobody else gets paid that much per hour, and Donna’s going to shout her bloody head off when she finds out — not because she’ll be jealous (that isn’t Donna at all, jealousy), but because she’s going to worry about whether he can afford it, and how it’s going to affect everyone else, and at this moment, he doesn’t really care, because Rose’s tongue is touching her lip again.  

“Okay,” she says with a nod and an arch of her eyebrow.

“Welcome aboard, then.”

“Oi, barman!” He jumps, tearing his attention away and whirling around to find Donna standing at the service end of the bar, arms crossed and impatience written across her face. “Table four hasn’t been putting out a good-tipper vibe, and the speed you’re getting that lager out, looks like there won’t be  _any_ tip at all.”

“Right! Sorry!” He shakes his head, collecting his concentration, and takes the glasses to her. When turns around again, Rose is already working her way along the opposite end of the bar, seeing to a few new customers.

She’s absolutely brilliant, the perfect amount of friendly and open, but still professional. She’s exactly the kind of bartender he’d pour his heart out to, if he were the type that poured his heart out to bartenders.

Well, maybe there’s been a few times.

 _Maybe_.

He’s always checking out new pubs, loves stepping through the doors, the way it’s like walking into a different world, the smells and the sights and the sounds. Everybody’s got their own take on it, and he loves that, even if he’s always happy to return home to the Tardis after he’s done.

Maybe Rose could come on a scouting trip with him, check out that place a couple of blocks over, the one under new ownership.

Donna comes back with her tray empty, waving it in front of his face.

Or maybe he should concentrate on his own pub right now.

“What’s with you?” Donna looks annoyed, but he recognizes the look in her eye, the one that says if it’s something big, if it’s not just him daydreaming, if he’s got real trouble, she’d have everyone out of the bar and something in a single malt poured in a matter of minutes.

“What? No, nothing, fine, brilliant, top notch,” he says, and he forces his eyes to stay away from the end of the bar, stay away from whatever Rose is doing.

“Yeah?  _Wizard_. Get your head in the game! We’ve got a group of Americans on a breakaway coming through the door and it’s just you and Blondie in the net.”

He laughs at that, “I think you’re spending too much time with Mickey. And I think he’s spending too much time at Tricia Delaney’s table. Why don’t you go ask after him? I’ve got a couple of kegs to bring up.”

Donna rolls her eyes, but turns on her heel, cutting a path to Mickey and yanking him away from Tricia by the shirt.

Rose brushes by him, reaching for a clean glass, and he’s so focused on the skin of her forearm, the light dusting of hair, the fragile bones in her wrist, that he almost misses what she’s saying.

“That’s still going on, eh?” She nods at Mickey, who’s got his head turned, calling out to Tricia as Donna drags him across the pub.

“Oh, is there history there?” He doesn’t want to know necessarily, but he  _does_  want to keep talking to Rose.

“He’s fancied her for a while,” Rose says, pouring a pint. “I think he took up with her after I left. Don’t know really, didn’t stay in touch much.”

Ah, so she’s been gone, that would explain why he’s never seen her. Because that blonde hair and wide grin aside, he’s sure he wouldn’t have forgotten if Rose Tyler had been in the Tardis before.

“Left to where? Where did you go?” The words are out of his mouth before he can stop himself and he rushes after them. “You don’t have to tell me. I mean, we don’t really have a human resources department, but if I’m out of line – or anybody’s out of line – you can talk to Donna, she’ll get it sorted. She can even make up some paperwork for it, if you’d like, fastest typist I’ve ever seen, Donna is. Not a skill she gets to use much here, but still, we can –”

Rose’s eyes are wide as she shuts the tap off and he claps his mouth shut, tugging at his ear.

“That’s some gob you’ve got there,” Rose says.

“Believe it or not,” he replies, “you aren’t the first person to tell me that.”

Creases form around her still-wide eyes as she smiles, her full cheeks geting even fuller. “I’d never have imagined.” With that, she’s off to the opposite end of the bar again.

The Doctor leaves everything in her capable hands, heads to the kitchen. Martha’s out tonight — she’s got an evening class on Thursdays, and Adam Mitchell’s in instead. He’s an okay kid, manages not to burn the chips most of the time.

The kitchen’s full of pots and pans, hissing and bubbling, plates and order notes scattered everywhere. It’s chaos on a scale even the Doctor finds uncomfortable, nothing like the clean precision Martha maintains, but as long as everyone gets their food and none of the customers have cause to complain, the Doctor doesn’t micromanage the boy.

“Hopping tonight, isn’t it?” Adam says. “I’m already half a dozen orders behind! Isn’t there anyone out there who can come in and give us a hand?”

“Sorry mate, it’s bedlam out there, too,” the Doctor replies, scooping a few servings of chips into a basket and stepping out the back door, into the alley.

It’s long past dark, to the point of the night where the narrow passage smells like stale beer and kitchen rubbish and urine. “Wilf?”

A pile of rags near the corner stirs, staggers upright. “Doctor!”

The Doctor trots over to the elderly man, arms outstretched, and gives him an enormous hug before depositing the chips in his hands.

“That’s nice. Just like Christmas!” Wilf says, picking up the small packet of vinegar and tearing it open, sprinkling the chips before he bites into one. He closes his eyes and makes a happy humming noise.

Wilf practically came with the pub, has been around forever, living in the alley. Over the years, the Doctor has tried to set up living arrangements for him, and even offered to let him crash on the couch in the tiny flat above the pub, where the Doctor lives. But Wilf steadfastly refuses, chooses to stay out back, disappears when it’s cold and comes back in the spring and summer and early autumn. Donna is especially fond of him, has nicknamed him “gramps,” and she and her mum have adopted him, in a manner of speaking — bringing him food and clothes and generally looking after him.

“They draining you dry tonight?” Wilf says, his bushy eyebrows waggling as he eats another handful of chips.

“Got a load of Americans coming in, and a new bartender,” the Doctor replies, ambling toward the door to the cellar.

Wilf shuffles along. “This new bloke, he’s talking the Yanks into buying the good stuff?”

Smiling, the Doctor pulls a key out of his pocket — only one key for all the Tardis doors, front and back and cellar. “She certainly is.”

Wilf’s smile broadens. “Oh, well that’s all right then.”

“Yeah, I think it is,” the Doctor replies, heading down the stairs and reaching blindly ahead of himself for the string to pull the lights on. He knows this place like the back of his hand, probably doesn’t need to turn the light on to find the correct keg and haul it upstairs, this place is his home and has been for so long. But the old lightbulb makes a  _snick_ noise and flares to life, illuminating the compact, ruthlessly organized space.

Most things in the Doctor’s life are haphazard, ill-organized and unplanned. He likes it that way, stumbling from one thing to the next, unplanned adventures around every corner. But this cellar is different.

He passes by the liquor, the mixers, and the ciders, and hauls out a keg of Boddingtons, something harmless for the Americans.

Wilf’s waiting at the cellar door when he gets back up, offering to help, like he always does, and the Doctor waves it off, like he always does.

He ducks back down one more time for a microbrew and locks up after himself, allowing Wilf to hold open the back door as he drags the kegs inside.

There are trolleys and sack trucks in pieces all over the pub, Donna seems to buy him a new one every month, but he’s never quite gotten in the habit of using them. Easier just to drag and pull and roll things where he needs them to go.

She keeps telling him he’s going to put his back out, but it hasn’t happened yet, and anyway, he’s not  _that_  old, is he? Old enough to put his back out? Old enough to, oh, say, seem like a pervert for the amount of times he’s noticed Rose Tyler’s tongue in two days?

As he makes his way through the kitchen, Adam apologizes distractedly over his shoulder for being unable to help. It’s a little personality quirk of Adam’s – showing up just to do the cooking and mysteriously disappearing anytime there’s anything else that needs doing, but tonight he’s got raw chicken breasts in each hand and the Doctor grunts in acknowledgement, lugging a keg back toward the bar.

Small black wheels appear in his eye line on the floor, next to a pair of scuffed black boots. He follows the boots up to legs clad in black tights, lingering where they meet the fraying hem of a denim skirt before he hears the sound of throat being cleared.

Rose Tyler is looking at him with sparkling amusement, “Wouldn’t that be easier with this?” She says and gestures to the trolley, one he apparently hasn’t stripped for screws and parts.

“Nah, builds character this way,” he says, pulling the keg a few more feet.

“Builds a hernia, more like,” she says, but lets him pass, wheeling the trolley past him and tipping the second keg onto it.

A small queue has built up by the time they get the kegs behind the bar, and he puts off tapping them so they can take care of some customers first.

When he finally returns to them, he finds Rose crouched down beneath the bar, pulling out empties. They work together to get everything sorted and when they’re done, he’s already got the feeling he needs her more than she needs him.

“Where’d you learn to do all that?” He asks, and tries to keep the awe from his voice.

“Oh, you know, here and there. Had some odd jobs, picked up a few things,” she says.

“And what else does your CV say?”

She grins at him, nodding at a customer’s order and beginning to fill it, “That I’m flexible.”

He nods, “Good, good, need a team player, someone not set in their ways, mostly because the Tardis has her own.”

Rose’s eyes skate the perimeter of the room, like she’s assessing the character of his pub and he wants to know, wants to know  _desperately_ , what she thinks.

“Oooh, I’ll have to remember that, yeah, that, too,” she says. “Got the bronze in under-7s gymnastics, though, so I meant _flexible_.”

There’s a moment where swallowing his tongue is an immediate and legitimate concern.

He pulls it together enough to muddle through, scratching at the back of his neck, “That’s – that’s brilliant. Never know when we’ll need someone…bendy. For, um, tight spots,” he wheels on a bloke with a mustache leaning against the bar. “You, sir, look like you could use a drink!”

At that moment, the antique jukebox in the back corner roars to life.  _Literally_ roars — a jaguar, the Doctor thinks it is — followed by Janet Jackson belting out “Black Cat.” The mustached bloke winces, has to raise his voice to be heard when he orders his drink.

Just like Wilf, the jukebox came with the pub. It isn’t one of those elegant upright Wurlitzers, all curves and bubbling trim; no, it’s a big, square hulking antique from the early 1960s, chrome and avocado green and yellowed plastic buttons. The Doctor spends more time repairing that jukebox than anything else around the place, and no matter how much he tinkers, it still does this on occasion — flickers on as though it’s sentient, and spits out a random song, chosen by its faulty circuitry.

The jukebox is cheesy, the Doctor knows — Mickey’s been prodding him to get rid of the thing, to upgrade to something with a touchscreen and decent speakers. But no matter how logical Mickey’s arguments, the Doctor can’t quite bring himself to do it, because the jukebox is part of the character of the Tardis, and so the old girl stays in the corner.

There’s a booth packed full of women out for a hen night, and they start belting out the lyrics right along with Janet: “You’re a rebel now, don’t give a damn, always carrying on with the gang, I’m trying to tell you boy, you won’t realize ‘til it’s too lateeeeeee!”

The jukebox keeps going the rest of the evening, all the way ‘til closing time — it even obliges a few patrons who put in coins and push the buttons by actually playing the correct songs.

Donna has a date — she hasn’t stopped reminding the Doctor, every chance she gets, all week long. And so when she knocks off fifteen minutes early, with a wink and a flip of her hair and a “Don’t be surprised if I’m wearing these clothes tomorrow, too,” the Doctor isn’t surprised. Mickey stays long enough to clean up the front with him and Rose, although he’s a bit distracted, with Tricia still sitting in the booth in the corner, waiting.

When they have the last chair on the last table, and the floor swept, and Adam’s still banging around in the kitchen, the Doctor lets Mickey go, too. He leaves with Tricia on his arm.

The Doctor turns to Rose, glances at the bar, where she stowed her little pink purse when she came in earlier. “You can go too, if you want. Adam ought to be finishing up anytime soon.”

Rose cocks her head. “Sounds like he’s done already.”

She’s right, the banging in the kitchen actually stopped a few minutes ago, the Doctor realizes. Rose pops behind the bar, gets her purse. The front’s already all locked up, so she follows him through the swinging door that leads into the kitchen, to exit through the alley.

“Blimey!” The Doctor comes to a sudden stop, so sudden that Rose bumps right into him, makes a small squeaking noise of surprise.

The kitchen is still, to put it mildly, a disaster. There are sticky, dirty pots piled high in the sink, along with a huge stack of plates and chip baskets. The griddle’s crusted in grease and bits of food. And of course, Adam is nowhere to be seen — his coat’s not on the hook, and the Doctor swears he’s going to give the boy what-for next time he dares show his face.

Rose doesn’t miss a beat, dropping her purse on the conspicuously empty hook and shoving her sleeves up to her elbows.

“No, no, you don’t have to,” the Doctor says, fumbling to unbutton and roll up his own sleeves, but he can’t get them to stay up and goes to work on the buttons down the front instead.

His oxford is already filthy, spots of lager and grease speckled across the blue fabric, but there’s no reason to make a bad situation worse and he strips it off so he can wash in his t-shirt. There’s dirt on the brown of his trousers, too, but he suspects washing in his pants would not be ideal behavior.

Rose is watching him from the corner of her eye as she turns the faucet on and he panics for a moment. Some of his undershirts have seen better days, and he raises his arm as casually as possible, checking to make sure the cotton there is still white and clean-looking.

Thankfully it is, but the smirk Rose gives him indicates she definitely noticed him checking.

“Right, um, how shall we do this?” He says, but Rose has already started scouring the pots, the sink rapidly filling with suds.

She nods at the rags next to the sink and he tries not to be distracted by the movement of her hands dunking and emerging from the water, fingers wrapped around a sponge.

“Of course, you wash, I’ll dry,” he says. “Wash and dry, Mutt and Jeff, Shiver and Shake, can’t have one without the other, well, I suppose you could. But then you’d just have Jeff. Or Shake. Or dry. Not nearly as powerful when they’re not, you know, together, better with two, I always say.”

He can’t stop his mouth, words streaming out in a steady current like the water from the tap.

The roar of the jukebox breaks through to the kitchen and Robert Plant and the rest of Led Zeppelin are suddenly encouraging him, quite loudly, to ramble on.

He manages to shut his mouth, taking a pot from Rose and beginning to dry it.

“Pick this skill up from an odd job, too?”

Rose laughs, pressing harder to get a film off a pan, “No, this one’s  from the Jackie Tyler School of You’ll Do Your Chores Before You Go Out.”

He nods, letting the music play in the background for a few moments before diving back in.

“And Jackie’s your mum then? Or, well, Jackie could be a bloke’s name, too, couldn’t it? Brother, maybe? Or is it – a husband?”

He visibly cringes at the way his voice pitches higher on the last word, but he can’t stop his eyes from skittering to her ring finger, the unadorned skin there.

“You are a curious one, aren’t you?” Rose says, but there’s laughter in her tone. “Jackie’s my mum, I don’t have any siblings. Could have done, I guess, but my dad died before they got to it.”

Oh, terrific, well done, Doctor. Maybe they  _do_  need a human resources department, one to save him from himself.

“I’m sorry,” he says, and then there are more words, pressing against his teeth, breaking over his tongue. “No – no husband then?”

She shakes her head at him this time, a grin with just a hint of tongue splitting her face.

“No husband,” she confirms.

“No — good, that’s good, young woman like yourself, footloose and fancy free.”

He bears down hard on the food caked onto the pot in his hands, sucks on the inside of his cheek as he tries to keep from talking again. He feels like a bull in a china shop, a bull without any sense of balance or self-control or maybe he’s a  _drunk_ bull in a china shop, even though he didn’t have anything to drink tonight. Not like last night, when they’d done shots with the customers because Jack was around (and things  _always_  tend to go that way when Jack is around).

But being here, alone in the kitchen with both of them up to their elbows in greasy pots and sudsy water, the Doctor is definitely feeling tipsy. Which is why, no matter how hard he sucks on his cheek, he keeps right on going, knocking over metaphorical china in Rose Tyler’s metaphorical shop. “Footloose, I mean, of course, if there isn’t a boyfriend, either.”

She glances at him sideways, one eyebrow lifting. Her expression is all composed smugness, but there’s a definite tint of crimson to her cheeks, the tiniest of nervous bites on her lip.

Just like that, her eyes return to the frying pan in her hands, the caked-on grease. “You know how it is, when things end badly. Bit of time, mended hearts, that sort of thing.”

“Oh. Right. Sorry.” He picks up a pot, uses the sprayer to rinse suds off. “About the heart that needs mending, I mean.”

“Is this some sort of job interview, after-the-fact, or something?” she says.

That polite little shut-your-gob, smack-in-the-face, was exactly what he needed to stop the drunk bull right in its tracks, to sober his already sober self right up.

Rose Tyler is his  _employee,_ and nothing good can come of the train of thought he’s riding right now. Sure, Sarah Jane had left on good terms, that hadn’t ended as badly as it could have. Mostly because Sarah was fantastic — forgiving, and fantastic. And the first few weeks when Martha had come on, the moon-eyed looks she’d cast his way, and how Donna had pulled her aside and said something ( _something about how terrible a boyfriend the Doctor was, and how Martha deserved better — at least that’s what Donna told him later, when he’d cornered her and asked_ ).

The Doctor didn’t need to go mucking this up the first day — a competent barkeep. The Tardis hasn’t had one of those in … well, as long as it’s been since the Doctor found himself babbling and blushing like a fourteen year old in front of a woman he was attracted to.

The odds of him landing someone like Rose Tyler: slim to none. The odds of Rose Tyler staying in the job if he doesn’t scare her off with his too-personal third degree: better than good.

“No, you’re definitely in. The job, I mean!” He takes a clean, dripping pot from her, pulls the rag from where he’s stowed it on his shoulder, and starts drying.

“Good,” Rose says. “’Cause if I’m being honest, this is much better than Henrik’s.”

“Odd hours and interesting people, never a dull moment!” With a grin, the Doctor spins the pot in one hand — well, tries to. The pot drops right back into the dingy, soapy water; a virtual tsunami cascades over the front of the sink, right onto both of them.

Rose squeals in surprise, jumping backward, her shoulders hunching as she stares down at her soaked clothes in shock.

“Sorry! Butterfingers!” the Doctor says, yanking his t-shirt out of his waistband, squeezing water out of the ends and trying to hand Rose the damp dishrag at the same time, so she can mop herself up. “Sorry!”

He’s embarrassed, but not embarrassed enough to stop from sneaking a glance at her, and then falter, unable to shift his eyes away as she begins to laugh.

The sound is infectious and full and he joins in quickly, the two of them giggling like children up past their bedtime.

It’s a lost cause trying to dry off, everything they’d use to do it is damp, at the very least.

Their laughter slows and he tries to calm his breathing, and his heart, it’s fast enough that it feels like he’s got two of them, pumping blood and hormones and a fizz right through his veins.

He works to keep from staring at the way the water’s made Rose’s shirt stick to her, the edges of her bra and all her curves outlined perfectly. The jukebox, which had fallen silent at some point, springs back to life from the other room.

“ _Ch-ch-ch-changes_ ,” David Bowie’s voice echoes through the kitchen and, oh, of course.

“Do you want something dry? A change of clothes?” He says. “I just live upstairs and you can’t walk home like that.”

Rose eyes him and he feels like he’s being sized up. He tries to keep his face as open as possible, tries not to let whatever it is that’s knocking around the back of his skull with those images of her cotton-covered breasts, from showing.

She nods after a moment and he exhales a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding.

“Sure,” she says. “Do you want to finish up first?”

He looks back at the dishes, the bubbles beginning to dissipate in the sink, “Nah, leave it, I’ll do it in the morning.”

She shrugs in agreement and he smiles at her, and then just keeps smiling at her. It’s apparently gone on a while, if her confused look is anything to go by.

“The clothes?” Her eyebrows arch with the words, and he shakes his head, trying to refocus.

“Right, right, um, here, it’s this way,” he says and leads her out the back door before locking up.

Wilf isn’t in the alley, or if he is, he’s asleep, and the Doctor leads Rose to the fire escape, pulling down the ladder.

“This is how you get to your flat?” Rose asks, but she doesn’t seem put off, just curious.

“There’s a front entrance, too,” he says, scrunching up his face a little bit, trying to remember more about it. “I’m not quite sure where it lets out though, or where the door to get to it is.”

He gestures for her to head up the ladder ahead of him, it wouldn’t be the first time he’s had to save someone with poor climbing skills, but Rose is on the walkway in front of his window before he can even offer to help. He darts up the ladder behind her and moves to unlock the window with his key.

“So your window has a door lock and you’ve lost your door?” She’s grinning at him again, and how do someone’s eyes just keep sparkling like that? Doesn’t it bother her, going around all the time, beaming at people like they’re the only ones that matter in the whole world?

“Something like that,” he tells her, hiking the window up and motioning for her to duck inside, following once she’s through and shutting it again.

He fumbles for the light switch and tries not to notice the disarray of his flat – if he doesn’t, maybe she won’t either.

It’s a studio, but it runs above the entire length of the pub, and he jogs across the floor toward his wardrobe as Rose looks around.

“You’re trying to find the door, aren’t you?” He says, grabbing a blue football jersey, with  _The Tardis_  printed across the front in white.

Her tongue touches her teeth briefly, “You’d think it’d be at the front, where it is in the pub, but –” she trails off, eyes lingering on the door-less wall.

“To tell you the truth,” he says, handing her the jersey and a matching pair of athletic shorts, “I think it  _moves_.”

She squints around the room one more time.

“Loo’s through there,” he says, gesturing at the only visible door in the flat. “You can keep those, by the way. You’re a part of the team now. We practice on Sunday afternoons.”

She looks at the clothes in her hands and back up at him, “That’s today,” she says. “I mean, that’s – that’s later on today.”

“Yep,” he says, the pop of the word hanging in the air as she shuffles off to change.

Rose takes a while in the loo – what  _is_  it with women? The Doctor can’t imagine spending so much time in such a claustrophobic little space, it’s like the bathrooms magically larger on the inside for women, like they’ve stumbled into Narnia instead of a tiny room with a toilet and a sink. And the longer she takes, the more time the Doctor has to think about exactly how long it’s been since he scrubbed the toilet and wiped the toothpaste off the sink, and whether instead of finding Narnia, Rose has actually discovered a novel form of flesh-eating bacteria due to his sub-par housekeeping skills, and is in a battle for her life.

The Doctor hurriedly changes his own soaked clothes, finding a fresh pair of trousers and oxford. Then he frantically scoops up towels and boxers, draped across the kitchen chairs and atop lamps, and crams the sizeable pile under his bed. He’s just finished when the door to the loo finally opens.

“Oh, those fit, then,” he says, trying to keep his voice from pitching high. Trying not to be obvious in the way his eyes trace up and down her body, the word “Tardis” stretched pleasantly across her chest, the curve of her thigh at the hem of his athletic shorts.

“Do you actually play football in these?” she asks, pinching the side of the jersey cotton fabric of the shorts and pulling them out.

“Yeah,” he replies.

“Mmm.” The Doctor has no idea what that humming noise means, whether it’s good or bad, except she looks amused — that’s got to be good, right?

Another thing the Doctor has no idea of: what’s gotten into him. Because the response he’s having to this woman is so far out of character, he can’t begin to process it rationally. 

He’s the Doctor, never met a stranger; he has a way of pulling everyone into orbit around himself, shifting the flow of their lives. He’s always been the biggest object in these spatial relationships, the one whose gravitational pull tended to dominate, and while his friends undeniably have an effect on him, he’s seen how his influence shifts their existence profound ways, too. Sometimes it isn’t for the best — although most times things move in a positive direction.

But right now the Doctor is not the primary force of gravity in this room. He can’t find his footing, doesn’t know how to navigate this terrain when he’s having a hard time telling which way is up. There’s something profoundly different about Rose. And the pull he feels when she’s sharing space with him, it isn’t the cold crushing inevitability of a black hole; its the searing, refining fire of a supernova, hot and all-consuming and, if he’s honest, terrifying.

He’s known this woman for two days. He can’t imagine his life without her.

He must be barmy.

Of course, his entire existence has been nothing but one barmy thing after another. So at least  _that_  bit’s familiar.

“You have another one, for tomorrow?” Rose gestures to the shirt. He nods, reaches up out of nervous habit and rubs the back of his neck. “Thanks, then.” She glances around the loft, at the sparse furniture and the books scattered everywhere and the cold mugs of tea on the counter. 

Clearing her throat, she says, “I ought to be getting home. Mum’ll be worried. She’s been doing a lot more of that since I got back to London few weeks ago.”

The Doctor’s mouth is moving before his brain starts working: “Right, just hear me out on this. If you let me walk you home this time around, well-l-ll, at least let me take you two blocks north — which might or might not be on the way to your mum’s flat, I don’t know — but it’s worth it. Because there’s this fantastic all-night chippy, and I owe you, to make up for the mess I made of your clothes. And I figure I can start with a basket of chips, and maybe you can call your mum and tell her you’re okay and I’ll have you home in a jif.”

She tips her head to the side, chewing on her bottom lip. There’s a grin dancing around the edge of her lips, and oh god, he wants to see her in his flat like this, in his clothes, in the morning. Every morning. 

“Okay,” she says with a shrug. 

The Doctor doesn’t realize he forgot his wallet until they’re at the counter of the chip shop, food in hand. She rolls her eyes even while she’s grinning, slaps his arm and tells him he’s a terrible date ( _is that what this is? a date?_ ) and pulls out her purse to pay.

By the time he leaves her at the stairwell of the Powell estate, the sun is coming up, and he’s wondering how he’s going to get through the hours between now and football practice this afternoon.

“Good luck with those dirty dishes,” Rose says, and disappears up the stairs.

 

 


	3. Chapter 3

Rose sneaks into the flat with practiced ease.

It’s been a while since she’s had to mind the squeaky hinges, the creak of the floorboards just past the entryway, but her body remembers, and gets her through in near complete silence.

The light’s on in her mum’s room, a bright line visible at the bottom of her door, and Rose practically dives through the door of her own room, shutting it softly.

It’s silly, really, she’s a grown woman, she’s allowed to stay out until sunrise if she wants.

Except – she doesn’t feel like a grown woman anymore, she feels like a kid again, one with a crush.

One with a crush she is going to get over. Soon. Now. Because she’s getting paid more an hour than she’s ever had before and she’s not going to mess it all up for good ( _great_ ) hair and charming little dimples.

The door to her mum’s room opens and she hears her in the hall, shuffling about in front of her door, “Rose, honey, are you in there?”

All that work sneaking around for nothing. Rose had probably woken her up herself when she’d checked in before the chips.

“Yeah, Mum, I’m here,” Rose says, reaching to pull the door open.

Her mum’s mouth opens like she’s already going to start in on something, but she stays silent, eyes widening at Rose’s outfit.

“What are you wearing? Is that a footie uniform? What’s a _Tardis_?”

Even though there’d been no drinking tonight, something about staying out til it’s light lends itself to a headache and Rose can feel one growing with every question her mum asks.

“Yes, it’s a footie uniform, and a Tardis, _the_ Tardis, is the pub I’m working at now,” Rose says, slipping by her mum and into the loo. A shower, a nice hot shower, some sleep and up in time for practice.

She closes the bathroom door and starts the water, her mum’s voice carrying right through the wood.

“A pub! What happened to Henrik’s?”

Rose strips off the uniform, careful to fold it up, she probably doesn’t have to wear it to just a practice, but maybe it would be nice to, show she’s part of the gang now and all.

Her fingers catch on the material of the shorts and she forces herself away from thoughts of the Doctor in them. Cotton like this, it’s so _thin_ and _clingy_ and how does a bloke even have shorts like this anymore?

It reminds her of a P.E. uniform, sneaking glances at the boys’ classes across the field, and, great, terrific, now she’s back to feeling like a teenager.

But really, what kind of pants could you even wear in these? Have to be something equally clingy, right? Traditional boxers – surely those would bunch up in shorts like this. Maybe he doesn’t wear any pants, but, no, couldn’t do, then _everything_ would show, so…briefs? Doesn’t seem like a y-fronts sort of man, except what could she possibly know about what sort of man he is after two days?

Except that he’s the sort of man whose rambling is apparently violently contagious.

Her mum’s voice breaks through again, “Rose! Henrik’s! What happened?”

She pulls back the curtain and steps into the shower, “I’m making more money now, Mum! It’s the same pub Mickey’s at!” she shouts and whatever her mum’s said in reply is lost in the noise of the spray.

After the shower, Rose makes a call to Shareen — she’s been desperate for more shifts at work, constantly complaining about the fact that their manager hasn’t given her enough and how she can’t make rent. Shareen agrees to take on all of Rose’s time this upcoming week, so Rose can start at the Tardis sooner rather than later — if Rose will cover Shareen’s shift this afternoon.

 _It’s a more than reasonable trade_ , the rational part of Rose says. _Generous, and reasonable, and very much an offer she should accept._

Stuffing down the irrational part of her brain that’s screaming _Doctor in a footie uniform,_ Rose agrees.

She calls the manager at Henriks, tells him about the shift change, and about the fact that it’ll be her last. Then she realizes she doesn’t have the Doctor’s number, and no one’s answering the phone at the pub, so she calls Mickey instead, asks him to let the Doctor know why she isn’t there for practice.

Rose is, to put it mildly, exhausted. It’s been a while since she pulled an all-nighter. The last few were all-nighters of the screaming and rowing variety, slammed doors and smashed hearts. But last night was all the best kinds of things she’d ever felt around Jimmy Stone — fluttering, excited, breathless and wanting — and none of the bad things.

And, of course, the man she’s feeling all these good things about, he’s her boss.

Which means the fluttering and wanting, those aren’t smart, really; noticing how incredibly long and dexterous the boss’s fingers are, blatantly staring as he plucked chips from the basket and popped them into his mouth, not exactly professional; getting distracted and losing the train of conversation because she’s standing in the boss’s flat and picturing him in his pants, that’s just a surefire way to lose her new job and better salary.

So.

When Rose leaves for work, she waits at her usual bus stop, hops onto the bus, and only then realizes she doesn’t have her bus pass. Doesn’t have any change, either.

She has to walk it – exhausted as she already is from a sleepless night, cranky because she’d rather be on the football pitch — she clocks in at Henriks twenty minutes late. Rose folds jumpers and hangs skirts and cleans out the dressing room. During her entire shift, Henriks already feels foreign, like a different life. 

Closing on a Sunday is miserable — the crowds are horrific, and there are always a few customers who linger long past the time a polite announcement warns them to make their final selections and fork over their cash. Forty-five minutes after the doors are supposed to be locked, Rose is kindly but firmly trying to herd the last customer out of the women’s department, casting meaningful glances at the cash register and her watch.

Rose has just finished ringing up the customer and escorting her to the door when her manager rounds the corner, a bag in his hand. “Thought you might want to take this down to Wilson before you leave,” he says. “Say goodbye, and all that.”

Rose takes the bag full of lottery money without complaint — Wilson is a nice bloke, has been a friend during her time working here, and even though she’s so exhausted she can hardly keep her eyes open, it’ll only take a second to pop down to the basement and say goodbye.

She’s waiting by the elevator when someone taps her on the shoulder. 

Whirling around, she makes a very dignified, not-terrified-at-all squeaking noise. The Doctor’s standing behind her. “Oh my god! You startled the life out of me! What are you doing here?!”

The Doctor reaches into his back pocket and pulls out a card with a flourish — it’s her bus pass.

“You left this on the floor beside my bathtub,” he says, lifting an eyebrow. “I thought you might need it, to get home. Didn’t want you stranded at this hour, in the dark and everything. Although do you know how long it took me to find you? This place is like a labyrinth! I wandered around the furniture department for ages, nearly had to cannibalize a sofa to survive.”

“We’re closed! Nobody’s supposed to be in here,” she says, leaning down to pick up the lottery money she’d dropped on the floor before plucking the card from the Doctor’s hand. 

“Ah,” he says, “that would explain the distinct lack of customers. I thought it was just, you know –”

He waves his hand in the air, clearly she’s supposed to follow along, but she can’t keep the blank look from her face.

“– the economy,” he finishes.

“Oh, right, of course. No, no, we’ve been plenty busy,” and she tries to convince herself that the fuzzy feeling in her head is all just from lack of sleep, and not from the way the Doctor looks, tight trousers and button down and perfectly messy hair.

She can _smell_ him, even, clean like a shower, aftershave and hair product, it’s spicy and warm and he really just came down here to give her a bus pass?

The elevator opens and he follows her inside, apparently unconcerned with rules and propriety and, oh, sod it, she’s leaving anyway.

She’s nothing short of completely exhausted, but the way the Doctor keeps looking at her as they walk down the hall to drop the bag with Wilson is forcing her to be alert, if only so she doesn’t blurt out something inappropriate, like asking for confirmation that he wears boxer briefs, because it’s the only logical option.

“How was practice?” She says once they’ve given the money over and are heading back toward the elevators.

“Good, I missed you though, I mean, _we_ missed you, the team, gotta see where you fit and all,” he almost seems flustered and Rose wants nothing more than to give him a hug. Blimey, being tired makes her boundaries disappear.

“Ah, yeah, I’ll make it out next time, I promise,” she says, and she absolutely means it.

“What are you doing tonight?” They’re back in the elevator, chugging slowly up from the basement.

“Well, am I supposed to work?” She’s not got a set schedule at the Tardis yet and the thought of another shift on her feet makes her panicky and hot, but it’s only her third day, she can’t just be skiving off.

“We’re never open on Sundays,” he says. “Sundays are boring.”

She grins at the way he says it, like he’s imparting some great wisdom.

“In that case, thought I’d go to sleep, seem to have forgotten to do that last night,” she says, not missing the Doctor’s guilty look.

“What, right away? If you go to sleep now, you’ll be up before the cockerels! You’ll shift your whole schedule and bar men, _maids_ , like lie-ins, didn’t you know?”

The after hours lights of Henrik’s are just flickering on, much softer than what she’s used to and she really does feel tired, but it seems like the Doctor’s going somewhere with this.

“And what would you propose I do instead of sleeping?”

He nods at the front of the store, the dirty football lying by the door.

“Thought we could kick that around, get a feel for your skills,” he says, his face full of so much hope that Rose knows she’s going to have a hard time denying him anything.

“All right,” she says and he beams at her. “I’ve got to clean out my locker anyway, I think there’s a pair of trainers in there.”

Half an hour later they’re at a small park, kicking the ball and forth, and she’s pleased to discover those trousers of his are every bit as clingy as the athletic shorts as he chases after the ball.

She makes it a few minutes longer before waving him off, walking to sit with her back against a tree as he jogs over to her.

The bark is too rough, her skin feels like it’s coming off she’s so tired, and she scoots away, lying down flat on her back in the grass.

The Doctor collapses himself next to her, and they watch the sky together for a few quiet moments.

“I like the stars,” he says.

“Me, too,” she says.

The next thing she’s aware of is waking up to her head pillowed on the Doctor’s shoulder and his arm curled around her waist.

He’s still asleep — hair a haystack, snoring softly, a bit of drool coming out one side of his mouth.

It’s adorable.

Adorable, in a she’d-like-to-snog-him-senseless kind of way. Which is entirely possible — his lips are parted just a little, the bottom one poking out enticingly, and most blokes would probably like to wake up being kissed by the woman they just spent a night spooning with, right? 

Rose is lost in the twilight of near-sleep, gazing at him, for only an instant. Because then it hits her, exactly what’s happened — she’s spent the night cuddling her new boss. _In the park._ Under a bloody _tree_ , in the park, and they’re both covered in dew and there’s an elderly man in a red beanie (homeless by the look of him) sitting on a nearby bench, staring at them and holding the Doctor’s football.

Rose taps the Doctor’s hip, her eyes glued to the man on the bench. “Doctor!” she hisses.

“Hallo!” the man with the football calls out cheerfully, giving her a jaunty wave.

“Not open till two o’clock, doesn’t matter how relative time is,” the Doctor mutters. Rose slaps him on the side again and he starts awake, suddenly sitting bolt upright. He looks around, rubbing his eyes. “Blimey, haven’t woken up in a park like this since Glastonbury three years ago.”

“Good morning, Doctor!” the elderly man says, waving again. “Had a kip on the green? One of those nights, was it?”

“Hallo, Wilf,” the Doctor replies, waving back. “Not the kind of night you’re thinking, mate. Just missed the last bus home. But it wasn’t half bad, anyway.” He glances at Rose, the corners of his mouth lifting in a small grin as he runs his hand through his hair. It’s sticking straight up — well, at every single point of the compass, actually, every last strand on-end. Rose feels a nearly irresistible urge to run her fingers through it, calm it down a bit.

He moves before she can act on the impulse, hops up and brushes a few blades of grass off his trousers before he offers her a hand up. She wobbles to her feet.

“This is that new bartender I told you about,” the Doctor says, as Wilf shuffles over. “This is Rose Tyler.”

Rose shakes his hand. “I’m Wilf,” he says.

“Wilf came with the pub,” the Doctor tells her.

“It’s an honor to meet you,” Rose says, grinning at him.

“They’ve got a special deal on for full breakfast at the place around the corner,” Wilf says, looking back and forth between the two of them. “Shall we?”

“Absolutely,” the Doctor replies without hesitation. He reaches out, and after a second Rose slips her fingers between his, hands swinging between them as they walk beside Wilf across the park and toward the nearest street, to buy Wilf breakfast.

It feels absurdly normal, to hold the Doctor’s hand like this. And absurdly normal, to have woken up with him. And the fact that no one’s mentioned how strange last night was, is even more absurd. But after an hour laughing with Wilf and the Doctor over eggs and beans and toast, the Doctor’s knee bumping hers at regular intervals, all that’s left is Rose’s absurd giddiness.

Wilf excuses himself to go to the loo at one point, and Rose finally does it – lifts her hands and says, “Do you mind? You’ve got something – just a little something – right there.”

The Doctor’s eyebrows lift. “A bit of grass? The dangers of outdoor sleeping, I suppose!” He leans his head forward.

And then, stomach fluttering, she buries her fingers in his hair.

It’s soft and thick, faintly tacky with yesterday’s hair product, and she wonders what he uses. Maybe she should have paid more attention when she’d changed in his bathroom. Not that she would’ve snooped, but, you know, maybe she’d have come across something, lying on the counter.

Or in a cupboard.

She rubs a few strands between the pads of her fingers, trying to get a better feel for it, and it seems like the most natural thing in the world to let her fingers drop down further, nails skating lightly over his scalp.

The Doctor makes a muffled noise, one that sounds a little bit like a groan, and Rose’s hand freezes. What the hell is she doing?

She untangles her hand, making sure to grab the piece of grass she ostensibly went in for and holding it up between them.

“Got it,” she says and, oh god, is that her voice?

The Doctor clears his throat, eyes fluttering between hers and the grass. He clears his throat again, “Thanks, uh, thank you.”

She tucks the grass into her napkin, curling the corner around it, before reaching for their dishes. She stacks them neatly, silverware piled on top, steadfastly avoiding the Doctor’s gaze and practically bussing the table while they wait for Wilf to return.

When she finally looks up, the Doctor’s smiling at her, eyebrows raised and clearly amused. Wilf is back before he can say anything and a few minutes later, they’ve finished paying and head back outside.

The Doctor’s hair is still a riot, more than it was earlier, even, and she flushes thinking about how it got that way. The sunlight catches it as they say their goodbyes to Wilf and she wonders if there’s a word for this, for being infatuated with someone’s hair.

Someone’s really great hair.

Wilf departs, promising to see them later, and the Doctor extends his hand to Rose once more. Maybe this is just the kind of bloke he is – a tactile one. Maybe he’s like this with everyone, and she can’t decide if that makes it better or worse.

(Even though a tiny part of her feels like she’s already seen enough in a few days to know he’s _not_ like this with everyone.)

“Where to, Rose Tyler?” He says, swinging their hands between them.

“Thought I’d go home for a bit, wash up before my shift today,” she says.

“Powell Estate it is!” He tugs on her hand and begins walking her home. Again. No one’s walked her home in years, and the Doctor’s done it twice in two days – a thought that makes her tighten her fingers around his.

They’ve just gotten to her building and it’s quiet enough yet, this early in the morning, that she can hear the opening of the window a moment before her mother’s voice.

“You bring him up here this time, Rose!” And the window slams shut again.

She stops short, completely mortified, and looks at the Doctor. His face is carefully neutral as he looks back at her.

“You don’t have to – ” Rose says, but the Doctor shakes his head.

“If I don’t, is she the type that’ll just stop by the pub instead?”

Rose sighs, “Yeah. She is.”

The Doctor does an admirable job of smothering his grimace before pulling her toward the stairwell.

“Well,” he says. “ _Allons-y_.”

The door is already unlocked, cracked open and waiting for them. Rose walks in first, like a scouting party sent ahead to look for traps and ambushes. There aren’t any tiger pits in the floor and Jackie isn’t waiting in the hallway with a butcher knife, so Rose steps into the empty living room.

“Kettle’s on!” Jackie calls out from the kitchen. “Tea’ll be out in a mo! Have a seat!”

The Doctor’s eyes are roaming all over the room, taking in the extensive ceramic cat collection, the gossip magazines on the coffee table, and the stack of freshly-folded laundry on the chair in the corner. And _everything_ about this is uncomfortable — her new boss, who she just spent the night with in the park and is _still_ wondering whether he’s wearing briefs or boxers — standing in her flat. Where she lives with her mum. Her very opinionated, very vocal mum.

There’s no possible way this is going to come out well for anyone, Rose decides, as Jackie keeps banging around in the kitchen and the Doctor plops down on the sofa, picking up a gossip magazine and thumbing through it as though he hasn’t a care in the world.

Except for the fact that his leg is jiggling like there’s an earthquake under his heel.

Rose has decided _sod it,_ and is about to grab his hand and head for the door, when Jackie glides through from the kitchen with a tray. “Well, isn’t this nice!” she says, chipper and cheerful, and that’s when Rose knows exactly how bad this is going to be.

“I’m the Doctor,” he says, popping to his feet and extending his hand for a shake.

“I put in milk,” she says, shoving a steaming mug into the hand. His long fingers instinctively wrap around the hot ceramic and he makes a hissing noise, snatching it by the handle with his opposite hand.

“Mum, the Doctor owns the Tardis, the pub I’ll be working at. Doctor, this is my mum, Jackie Tyler.”

“Delighted,” he says, and his eyes are so big and bright, he’s either terrified or disingenuous. 

“Had my daughter quit her job at Henriks, I heard,” Jackie says, sitting down on the chair across from the sofa. Rose sits down on one cushion, the Doctor sits down a decorous distance from her; there’s absolutely no touching or proximity going to happen while Jackie’s got the Doctor pinned with her thousand-yard stare.

“Keeping Rose out all hours. Your pub’s open all night every night, is it? Because I’d hate to think you’re taking advantage of the fact that you’re Rose’s employer, coercing her into doing anything sordid or improper.” Jackie stares at Rose. “We could file a complaint with the police, sweetie, draw up charges. Sara from the third floor, she had a sexual harassment lawsuit go through the courts last year, ended up with enough to buy a new entertainment system.” Her attention swivels back to the Doctor, like the blade of a guillotine slotting into place.

The Doctor opens his mouth, makes a soft stuttering noise, his chin bobbing as his lips soundlessly form words. Rose intercedes: “Mum, there’s nothing sordid going on.” She waves a hand between herself and the Doctor. “No charges, m’kay?”

“Nothing sexual about the nature of this relationship, then? It’s just a quick call to the police, really,” Jackie says.

The Doctor chokes on his tea, sputtering and coughing, the mug clattering as he puts it on the glass coffee table.

“Mum! No!” Rose says, her face wrinkling in horror. She firmly pushes away thoughts of snuggling against the Doctor’s long body, of the feeling of his hair between her fingers, of holding his hand on the way back to the flat. “No!”

“No!” the Doctor echoes emphatically. “Jackie, let me assure you I have a great deal of respect for Rose, and wouldn’t dream of doing anything improper or taking advantage or –”

Her mum fixes him with a hard look as he trails off, one that's a little bit like a threat.

"Well, so long as that's settled then, don't see why we can't enjoy our tea," her mum says.

Rose tries to tamp down the feeling of disappointment at hearing the Doctor say he wouldn't even _dream_ of anything improper. It's an irrational thought, of course he wouldn't, and she'd do best to stay away from all similar thoughts.

Regardless of how she woke up this morning.

The Doctor shovels an impressive amount of biscuits into his mouth, presumably to keep from having to talk anymore and they finish their cups in awkward silence, one broken only by Jackie turning the telly on to some gossip program.

Rose keeps trying to sneak glances at the Doctor out of the corner of her eye, feeling like she's brought a boy home from school and been told under no uncertain terms is she allowed to date him.

A few times he's looking at her, too, and their eyes skitter away. The last time it happens, Rose has had enough.

"Right, well, I'm going to wash up before my shift," she says. "Doctor, I'll walk you out."

The Doctor nods rapidly, hair fluttering with the motion, and then he's off the sofa and by the door like a shot, mumbling a goodbye to her mum.

She leads him out and back downstairs in more tense silence. She should say something, really. She should apologize, promise it'll never happen again, reassure him that she can keep work and home separate, _anything_ , but her mouth stays shut all the way out of the building.

The noise of the window opening doesn't surprise her and she doesn't have to look to know it's her mum. The Doctor hears it, too, and shifts nervously on his feet.

"See you later then," she says and then can't stop from blurting out an apology. "I'm sorry, I am _mortifyingly_ sorry, about all that."

The Doctor shakes his head reassuringly, "Haven't had to meet a girl's parents in _years_. Would explain why I'm so rubbish at it."

Rose stares at him, because it _had_ felt like that, but then he'd said -- and she'd -- oh, this is completely mental, the whole thing. She's reading too much into it or something.

"You weren't rubbish, my mum, she's, well, it was just me and her, and then I left, and I think she's just trying to protect me," Rose says, making sure to keep her voice low enough that it won't carry to the window.

"Protect you from me?" He says, a grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. "And who, Rose Tyler, is going to protect _me_ from _you_?"

Rose doesn't have an answer for that, because it seems an awful lot like flirting, like whatever her mum had said or done hadn't actually scared him at all, or not much anyway.

"Guess we'll find out," she says, and she can't keep the smile from her own face. "See you later."

And with that, she turns to the building, forcing herself not to look back.


	4. Chapter 4

Rose slips into the daily life of the Tardis like she’s always been there, like she’s always belonged. The Doctor didn’t doubt it would happen, but he feels a shiver of delight at the base of his spine as he watches it happen, anyway. Over the course of the first month, Rose becomes fast friends with Donna and Martha; she runs the bar with friendly precision and sales steadily rise as a result; and she always seems to know exactly when he needs that spare bottle opener she keeps in her back pocket and she slips it into his hand with a tongue-touched grin.

The Doctor tries to maintain some sense of decorum, tries not to end up spooning with Rose all night in the park again. And is mostly successful, on that front.

But it’s remarkable how often in her first month of employment, she forgets her bus pass. She’s always the last to leave — stays behind to help him every time at closing, and the bar has never been cleaner and the brass never more polished — and by that time it’s late, and she doesn’t have her bus pass, and the Doctor can’t stand to think of her walking home alone in the dark. So he walks her home, most nights. And if they happen to hold hands, and he happens to linger at the bottom of the stairwell, talking and occasionally  _leaning_ — well, it’s not like they’re kissing or anything, is it?

Rose is also usually the first to get into work, and he finally just gives her a key, hands it over on a little silver chain. Her eyes pop open wide and she takes it from him, beaming ear to ear.

“You’re sure?” she says.

“Completely, yeah,” he says, grinning back at her. She shoves the key back into his hand and turns around, lifting her hair, and he fastens it around her neck.

The next morning he wakes up to a knock at the window. Rose is on the fire escape outside his flat, two steaming cups of tea in her hands. Squinting and trying not to groan, he hauls himself out of bed, wrapping  up in the blanket, and waves at her; she uses her key and slips right in.

“After Jack and that group of Germans last night, and the shape you were in, I thought you might need a cuppa this morning,” she says, handing him the tea.

The Doctor doesn’t remember how he got upstairs after he won the drinking contest with the bloke from Munich. He also has no idea how he got out of his clothes, or who put the glass of water on the bedside table, or the bin on the floor nearby in case he got sick.

The Doctor grunts, shifting the blanket around his shoulders. His head is pounding, and the tea tastes delicious, and it doesn’t escape his notice that Rose is most pointedly looking at everything around his little flat except him. Then it dawns on him: the sheet isn’t covering as much as he’d thought, and his Union Jack boxers are on full display.

“Make yourself at home,” he mumbles, his face burning hot with blood as he slinks off into the loo, grabbing a pair of trousers and a t-shirt from the floor along the way. When he catches sight of himself in the mirror — hair sticking up straight like a startled animal’s, red-eyed and blinking and in his boxers, he realizes he looks like a sleepy five-year-old.

Bloody brilliant. Just how he wants Rose Tyler to think of him.

When he steps out a few minutes later, clothed and his hair tamed (as much as it ever is, anyway) by product, he finds Rose sitting on the floor in the living room area of the open loft, in front of the coffee table. She’s staring at the bills and business papers spread out there, sipping tea.

“Better?” she asks, glancing at him from the corner of her eye before she hazards a full look.

“Getting there,” he replies, plopping down on the floor next to her.

“What’s all this, then?” She gestures to the papers.

“Mff. Been having supplier problems — if I didn’t have a headache from the Scotch last night, I’d have one from staring at _this_  mess for weeks on end. I should ask Donna to take a look, but she’s been so busy with everything else, she doesn’t have the time.”

“I could take a look,” Rose says, tilting her head and shrugging nonchalantly. “If you’d like.”

The entirety of his business, every last detail and number and decimal point — putting it at her fingertips. “Sure,” he replies without hesitation. “Come up anytime you want, stay as long as you want. My flat is your second home.” Trying not to appear too flustered, he takes an enormous swig of tea. “So you can — ah — so you can get a handle on the numbers, I mean.”

Rose smiles and he might just be imagining it, but she looks a little flustered, too.

“Not supposed to open for a bit,” she says. “I could start now, if you want to finish getting ready? You could take a shower maybe?”

He laughs, “Why, Rose Tyler, are you implying I smell?”

Rose rushes to backtrack, “No, no, no, just I always feel better after I shower if I’ve been out drinking.” She pauses, smothering a grin.

“And you don’t smell now, but you might do later, and some of us are planning to spend the night with you.”

He coughs and she flushes red.

“Behind the bar, I mean,” she says. “At work. Spend the night with you, behind the bar, at work.”

He’s never been on more uneven ground with someone than he’s been with Rose this past month and he wouldn’t have it any other way. He could never see flat land again and he’d be fine with it, so long as it means she’s next to him.

“Right then,” he says. “In deference to people spending the night with me, I’ll go and wash up.”

He gestures at the papers on the table, “You can get started if you like, but don’t feel like you have to. I know it’s a right mess.”

Rose nods, already reaching for a stack of documents, and he shuffles off to the bathroom.

It might be the quickest shower of his life, he usually lets his mind wander a bit, but if he does that now, with Rose just outside, he’s going to get into some very inappropriate thoughts, so he keeps his hands and brain on the task of getting clean.

He’s dressed and ready again shortly and joins Rose on the sofa, where she’s scribbling furiously on a notepad.

“It looks like a cash flow problem,” she tells him and he laughs.

“Believe me, I know,” he says.

“But that’s just it, you  _have_  the money, it’s just too tied up. Some of these suppliers are billing you for product we won’t even touch until next year,” she says. “I haven’t figured it all out yet, but if we start ordering on our  _actual_  needs, instead of our anticipated ones, it’ll help a lot.”

He scrubs a hand through his hair, it seems obvious, but he’s been doing it this way for so long, he didn’t even think to look at that, let alone change it.

Rose Tyler revolutionized his business in the time it took for him to shower.

She apparently takes his awed silence as a bad sign, rushing to add more, “Plus there’s some suppliers we can consolidate and then leverage the bigger spend to negotiate lower rates. Like here, the chips wholesaler also offers paper products, and these breweries have a co-distribution agreement. Combined with the advance billing changes, we’d be operating well in the black almost immediately.”

It’s huge, what she’s done, and he’s thrilled, not just for what it means for the Tardis, but also because it shows once more just how brilliant, how completely indispensable, Rose is.

He pulls her into a hug before he can think better of it, arms twisting around her, and she returns it immediately.

“That’s amazing, Rose,” he says. “You’re amazing.”

They’re still hugging, and he’s still pretending he hasn’t noticed how good Rose smells, all sweet and vanilla-y, and, oh god, he needs to let go. He does it reluctantly, settling back into couch and Rose waits a moment before speaking again.

“Thanks,” she says, eyes darting immediately back to the papers. “What do you think? Do you want me to make the changes?”

Of course he does, why is this even a question she’s asking? She doesn’t need his permission.

Except. Oh. She does. Because he’s the boss.

“What if you could make changes, too?” It’s forming in his head, an idea he’s had in the past, but never thought to put into practice before.

“What? What do you mean?” Rose shuffles a few of the files around, fingers tracing the numbers.

“What if there were a board? A board that had equal say? Clearly I don’t always see the trouble spots, might be good to have some checks and balances.”

Rose’s eyes are wide. “You could do that,” she says. “Donna would be brilliant at something like that.”

He waits for her to look at him.

“You would be, too,” he says. “We could get some terms drawn up, I have a few other people in mind, as well.”

His mind is already racing – there’s Sarah Jane, for one, maybe even Wilf – get him some steady income, he’s never been shy about speaking his mind before. People who might not be  _in_  the Tardis anymore, but that he always thinks of as a part of it anyway.

Rose is still staring at him, “Are you sure?”

“Never been more certain about anything in my life,” he replies. “I’ll put a call in to my lawyer this week, see what I have to do to make it happen!”

Rose blinks at him, pivots her body so she’s facing him directly, the entirety of her attention fixed on his eyes. “You … have a lawyer? You don’t seem like the kind of bloke who’d have a lawyer.”

The Doctor takes another long sip of tea, buying himself a second to think. Because he doesn’t really want to discuss the reasons he’s had to keep a lawyer on retainer, and how it has to do with the pub a block over, the Iron Maiden, and its proprietor the Master. ( _Really._ Of all the ridiculous nicknames one could give oneself, at least the Doctor actually _has_ a doctorate in something. He’d bet all the lager in his cellar that the Master isn’t, in fact, a master of anything in particular. Except being a wanker.)

The Doctor puts the tea on the table and waves his hand vaguely. “You know, owning a small business, legal … _things …_ that have to do with the … law … white wigs and objections. Aaaaanyway! Enough of that! We’ve got work to do today, and I’m not going to get rid of this headache unless I eat some eggs. Care for some?”

The Doctor is on his feet and halfway to the kitchen already. Rose comes right along, and they cook breakfast together, maneuvering in the small open space between the stove and the table with some difficulty. More than once he turns around to find himself chest-to-chest with Rose, both of them stuttering and backing up and picking up pieces of toast from the floor.

And then they’re sitting at his little kitchen table — chipped formica and chrome — drinking tea and eating beans and toast and eggs, and they’re talking about nothing at all — the consolidation of national breweries, the best kind of grass to walk barefoot in, whether Rose’s eyes are brown or amber. She’s laughing, nibbling on one corner of a toast triangle, her tongue doing that _thing_. Under the table, he’s reflexively curling his toes, and then he scoots them forward a little, so his big toe bumps up against Rose’s sandal.

The conversation stops. She pulls her foot away, and he’s thinking _stupid_ and _this is what comes of wanting,_ but a heartbeat later the tip of her toes find his again. He feels the gentle press of the edge of her toenail, thinks about how it’s painted bright pink. His heart hammers in his ears and he grins at her over a forkful of beans, his eyebrows lifting. She lifts hers right back at him and takes a sip of tea, her foot sliding further along his, skin against skin along the side of her sandal.

When the Doctor’s mobile rings, both of them jump. The dishes rattle on the table.

It’s Donna. “Are you gonna open up today, barman? I’ve got prep work to do, and you haven’t even opened the alley door yet! Are you still in bed? Oh, lord. You’re not still _drunk_ are you?”

“No, no, I’m sober as a judge, keep your knickers on. I’ll be right down.” He hangs up.

“I’ll clean these,” Rose says, taking the dishes from the table. “You go on; I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

“Right, sure,” he says, standing up and rubbing at the back of his head. “You don’t have to – the dishes.”

“It’s fine, I don’t mind,” she replies, facing the sink, facing away from him. Is she worried what Donna would assume, seeing her climb down from his flat first thing in the morning?

Would it be so bad, people making that assumption?

Would it make it better or worse if the assumption was true?

The Doctor’s toes curl into the wood floor. 

“Right.” He pads away as Rose turns on the faucet.

Two hours later, Rose’s toes are all tucked away in trainers, ready for her shift behind the bar, and the Doctor tries to pretend he doesn’t miss them, but it’s no use.

Because he’s also been trying to pretend that they didn’t spend their morning meal playing _footsie_ , and that didn’t work either.

He’s filled Donna in on his plans to create a board and the appropriate calls have already been placed. Now it’s just a matter of actually receiving and signing the paperwork, and getting the necessary people on board, as it were.

The night passes in a blur – Jack brings in a large group of uni students in town on holiday and they go through an entire bottle of vodka, and more than half a keg all by themselves.

At one point he even has to run next door to the little organics shop, the Forest of Cheem, to beg Jabe to give him change in smaller bills. He invites Rose along to give her a break, too, and flags down Mickey to mind the bar.

Jabe’s helpful and friendly and more than a little flirty as she hands the money over, and he spends at least an hour trying to decide if Rose was jealous, a tiny bit, at least, because it had certainly seemed that way.

And he has to admit, he liked it.

He walks her home once everything’s cleaned up and he almost asks after it a few times, aborting the sentence, if not the train of thought, at the very last second. Rose seems even more keen to linger at the bottom of the stairs than usual, and he’s not in any hurry to get back to his empty flat.

“It was a good day, wasn’t it?” Rose says and she looks sleepy and happy and he wants nothing more than to always be the cause of those two things in her life. He could find a lot of ways making Rose Tyler sleepy, if he set his mind to it.

“It was,” he confirms, and because he can’t help himself, he moves a little bit closer to her where she’s leaning against the brick of the building.

“Should have those papers soon, you think?”

He grins and he can just feel the brush of her jeans against his trousers, he’s standing that close.

“Should do, yeah,” he says. “Why? Itching to be rid of me as your boss so soon?”

She smiles and drops her head, shaking it a little, “No, no, it’s just – that’ll be different. Things will be different, you know? It’s exciting.”

It’s completely daft, what he does next, but she’s raised her head again, and without thinking, he drops a kiss on her forehead.

“Yes, Rose Tyler, things will be different,” he says. “And it is _very_ exciting.”

She looks at him then, eyes wide and tongue between her teeth, and he wants to kiss her again, lower this time.

Instead he pushes off the wall behind her with his hand and Rose darts up the stairs, leaving him with a flush of heat and a goofy look on his face.

The papers arrive three days later.

The Doctor knows the return address on the flat manila envelope, knows exactly what’s inside, but he doesn’t open it. Instead, he slips it under the cash drawer in the register, out of sight, and when Donna bustles in a second later, she stops short. Squints at him.

“You feeling sick or something?”

The Doctor snatches a rag from the bar and starts polishing the taps. “No, nothing’s wrong, what makes you ask?”

“You look like you’re coming down with something. Either that, or you’re a million miles away. If you’re not feeling well, we can manage without you tonight. Go have a lie-down.”

It takes every ounce of the Doctor’s will to keep from bouncing up and down and grinning like an idiot. “I’m fine, I’ll be fine. Everything’s going to be fine.”

Donna frowns and tips her head at him, but doesn’t say anything else. And that’s the way it goes all night — Donna watching him from the corner of her eye, as though she expects him to faint or grow a pair of horns at any second.

The Doctor’s fine, he really is; distracted, certainly, but hardly sick. Matter of fact, he’s never felt better in his life.

He bounces back and forth between working behind the bar and mingling with the customers, trying not to look at the cash register and the manila envelope he knows is there, certainly not looking at Rose more than usual. Is he? No. Definitely not.

There’s a lull an hour before closing time, the hubbub of people at the bar dies down, and Rose rounds on him. “We’re out of Bacardi. Do you mind?”

He bounces off through the kitchen to the cellar, plucks a bottle off the shelf, and when he turns around, Rose is standing in the stairwell behind him.

“All right, spill. Donna asked me to help keep an eye on you, and you’re not acting like yourself. The way you’ve been running around all night, it’s like you’re … delirious or something.” Coming to stand in front of him, she reaches up, rests the back of her hand on his forehead. “Not feverish.”

“Not feverish,” he confirms, and her hand lingers on his face, slides down to caress his temple. He reaches up, wraps his fingers around her wrist and pulls her hand down between them. Laces his fingers with hers, palm pressed against palm.

“So what is it? What’s got you so out of sorts?” she asks, and it’s probably meant to sound nonchalant or confident or something, but the words are a throaty whisper, and she’s staring up into his eyes, breathless, with her lips parted.

“Rose Tyler,” he says, and it’s an answer to her question and a declaration and a plea, all at the same time. He tips his head forward, just as she tips her chin up, and his lips touch her cheek. Her body arches forward, arches into him. Her free hand ghosts against his hip, fingertips brushing his waist, and he lets out a stuttering breath, nearly drops the bottle of rum.

Closing his eyes, he musters every ounce of his self-control, leans down a fraction more and touches her mouth with his own. _Oh god,_ her lips are so soft, and warm, and his head is full of her scent. Chaste, gentle, no matter how desperate he is to pin her against the kegs stacked along the wall and finally _finally_ let his tongue and hands do what they’ve been itching to do for weeks — explore every inch of Rose, feel her quivering with need against his body, hear her whisper his name in his ear.

Instead, the Doctor pulls away and murmurs, “I’ll tell you after closing, I promise.” He opens his eyes, finds she’s got hers closed. “It’s a surprise.”

“A good one?” she says, blinking slowly, focusing on his face.

“The best,” he replies. And he realizes she isn’t going to be the one to step away, so he does it, still holding her hand, and together they go back into the pub.

When closing time finally rolls around, and the last patron is gone from the booth in the corner, the Doctor lets everybody off early. Donna pulls Rose to the side before she leaves, whispers a few words in her ear, and Rose nods solemnly before Donna troops out the door with Mickey and Martha and the Doctor locks the door behind them.

When he turns around, Rose is sitting on a barstool, leaning back on the bar with both elbows. She’s got her legs crossed, she’s all curves and flushed cheeks.

“All right then, Doctor, let’s have it.”

He knows the exact size of the Tardis, he's paced the floorboards off, painted every wall, dealt with building inspectors and exterminators and a thousand other things, but right now, with Rose Tyler sitting on the other side of it, the Tardis feels so much bigger.

There's a route right to her, just past some tables, but he diverts to the bar, walking behind it, extra mindful not to trip, and he still hasn't said anything by the time he's reached the register. Because what is there to say really? _In a few minutes, assuming we can find a pen, I won't be your boss anymore?_

Oh god, he should have made sure he had a pen.

Rose swivels around on the stool to face him, "Really? You're going to close that out _right now_?"

He can tell she's trying to keep herself from whining, but it's there, lingering along the edges of her voice and he grins at her.

"Nope," he says and knocks the drawer open with a rap of his knuckles. He pulls the envelope out and sets it on the bar, sliding it over to her when she doesn't make a move for it.

"Paperwork came in," he says. "Have a look."

She lifts the envelope off the bar and slips a finger under the flap before removing the forms.

Part of him wants to jump over the bar to her, it wouldn't be unheard of, he's done it before, but it's not usually graceful and he forces himself to walk around it instead, sliding onto the stool next to her as her eyes scan the forms.

After several long moments of silence, broken only by a few grumbles from the jukebox -- the one he'd had a long talk with the other day, about never playing Barry White during closing hours ever, ever again -- he can't take it anymore.

He has to know, has to ask, "What do you think?"

Rose's eyes are fixed to the bottom of a page and he leans toward her, scanning to see what she's looking at.

It's a long, empty line and her name printed underneath it. There's space for more names, more signatures, some she'll know and some she won't, and then, in the other column, there's a space for him to sign.

"You really want to do this?" Rose says, her voice is so quiet he almost misses it at first. "You really want _me_ to do this?"

In response, he reaches forward to push the papers from her hand onto the flat surface of the bar. There's a pen lying right near the taps, a pen he's pretty sure he's never seen before, but he's not going to look a gift horse, or a gift pen, in the mouth. He reaches for it, uncapping it before tilting the papers toward himself.

A moment later he's signed his name where it's supposed to go and he shifts the papers back, handing her the pen.

"Your turn," he says.

Rose's fingers brush his as she takes the pen and he goes still at the movement, holding himself that way until she puts the pen to paper. She signs her name, a looping, legible cursive that makes his own name look like a foreign language, one made entirely of circles, and that's it.

It's done.

They'll need the rest of the signatures, need it formalized, but for all intents and purposes, she's now just as much the boss of this pub as he is.

"So, Rose Tyler, anything special you want to do in your first official act as an equal part of this fine establishment?"

She smiles at him, a slow, sexy thing, and drops her eyes to his mouth. The air in the pub has gone still and dry and he licks his lips reflexively, feeling his heart speed up.

Rose's eyes shift back to his, and then she's turning toward him, leaning closer, their knees bumping.

His eyes slip shut before he can stop them and he's waiting, hanging on the very edge, for something, _anything_.

Her voice comes out husky and low, the heat of her breath ghosting over his lips.

"Thought I'd paint the door," she says.

He rocks back suddenly, eyes popping open as he processes what she's said. The stool tips onto one leg for a moment, thudding back to ground as he stammers a response.

"Paint the door?" He can't keep the high, panicky pitch from his voice. "Paint the _blue_ door? I -- why -- I don't -- what? That door has been blue for _forever_ , well, I say forever, probably wasn't blue when it was a tree," he's tugging so hard on his ear it's liable to come off soon. "But really, it's been blue for a long time, a long, long time and --"

Rose is laughing at him.

"-- oh."

He's off his stool in a flash standing in front of hers as she turns to face him. He plants his hands behind her on the bar on either side of her, caging her in.

"That was not very nice," he says.

She grins, tongue right at the corner of her mouth.

"Power's gone to my head already," she says.

He steps closer and her legs open to accommodate him, pressing warm against the outside of his thighs.

"That's _equal_ power," he says, leaning his head toward hers. "You'll have to find something we both agree on."

She tilts her head to meet his, foreheads resting against each other and if she proposes painting the door again, he's going to tear the damn thing off its hinges himself.

"Let me know how you feel about this then," she says and she shifts, pressing her lips to his.

It's soft and light and exactly like the kiss on the stairs. The one he wanted to take so much farther.

He pulls back after a long moment, lips tingling.

"I'm going to need to hear more about it," he says, and he has to swallow, has to take a moment before he can continue. "To give it all due consideration."

Rose brushes her nose alongside his, "Oh, of course, meticulous, you are."

And he can't handle it anymore, the restraint and the tension and the absolute want running through his body.

He tilts his head and moves in again and Rose meets him halfway, mouths opening and, oh god.

She nips at his bottom lip, her tongue following after, and he moves in closer, arms lifting from the bar to wrap around her as he slides his tongue out to meet hers.

Her hands land on his hips, fingers bunching up the material of his shirt, and she's pulling him closer still, mouth hot and wet and _Rose_.

He pulls her up against him and she stands from the stool, feet dropping to the floor as he breaks the kiss only to be tugged back into it.

Rose Tyler's tongue, he's going to make a new drink and dedicate it to her tongue, the way it's snaking alongside his.

And her lips, the way she pulls back to readjust, soft and pink and the exact match for his.

Her hands wind into his hair, tugging and scratching and he remembers a month and a lifetime ago, Rose's fingers in his hair in the middle of breakfast and how much he'd wanted to do then exactly what he's doing now.

His own hands won't stay still, running down her spine and lower, fingers catching on the back pockets of her jeans and that's perfect, that's the perfect place for his hands, he'll keep them there forever.

She backs him up toward a table and he throws an arm out behind him, turning a chair to just the right spot at the very last second as the force of her takes him down into it. The movement breaks the kiss and he ends up with a lapful of smiling, panting, glassy-eyed Rose Tyler.

He wants to say something, something witty and debonair, but there's no way, he's certain she can feel him through his trousers and it's only going to get worse.

Or better.

He settles on fixing her legs, moving them so she's straddling him and he has never, ever been happier that the Tardis and all her fixtures are made of very, very sturdy things.

Rose rocks into him and he echoes the movement before working his fingers through her hair and tugging her mouth back down to his.

It only lasts a moment though, because this new height difference, it puts him at the perfect level for the smooth, soft expanse of Rose's neck and he moves his lips to the skin there.

He presses soft, wet kisses up and down the column of her throat and then he's tugging at the collar of her shirt, nipping at the join of her neck and shoulder, down to her collarbone while Rose squirms in his lap.

His mind is already skipping ahead, his horrible, lecherous mind, and he's got a mental image of trying to get up the fire escape like this, Rose wrapped around him and _squirming_.

It's the absurdity of that image that makes him pull back, and the way Rose chases after his mouth blindly for a moment almost undoes him.

"I think," he clears his throat. "I think I _love_ that idea."

Rose's chest is moving, up and down, up and down, with her breathing and it's incredibly distracting. She puts a finger under his chin, tipping his head so his eyes aren't fixated lower.

"Brilliant," she says. "I think we should talk more about it tomorrow. Work out a few of the details."

She shifts from his lap, feet back on the floor, and straightens her shirt.

He gives himself a moment to adjust and then stands, too, the movement only slightly stilted.

"Over chips," he says. "We could talk about it over chips?"

Rose grins, nodding, "I'll put it my calendar. Business meeting, the Doctor, chips."

He grabs her hand, tugging her toward the kitchen.

"Come on, I'll walk you home," he says.

He can't wait for work tomorrow.


End file.
